Aftermath
by AmethystB
Summary: What tears them apart, brings them together. In the ultimate twist of fate, what will be their downfall? Set after the events of Blood Of A Stranger. TruJack
1. Typhoid Mary

**A/N: As most of you will be aware, this story is the sequel to the fic _Blood of a Stranger_. It will follow the events from the first instalment and hopefully I will be able to tie up a few loose ends still hanging around. **

**This story will not be rated as high as the last, as it doesn't deal with too much gore and whatnot. Not that the first one did; I just wanted to make sure I didn't offend. **

**I will let this chapter tell the story and although some of the content is a little vague, hopefully you will all be able to follow. I highly suggest reading _Blood of a Stranger_, if you have not already.**

**Enjoy!**

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**Aftermath  
****Chapter One: Typhoid Mary**

**-You cannot play God and then wash your hands of the things that you have created. Sooner or later, the day comes when you can't hide from the things that you've done anymore. – William Adama, _Battlestar Galactica._**

* * *

_He marvelled at the simplicity of life, and the delicacy of death. It had turned him inside out, folded his outsides, exposed his still-beating heart. And yet, though he was gone, rid of his life, wallowing in his empty death, there was still one thing he yearned for. There was still one thing he remembered that he could not reach in death. Something, in life, he had tried to take with him to his grave. _

_And though he was gone, she remained. _

_She remained a lost, void, piece of life's great downfall. Depressed and lonely, she bore the scars that stung with a mighty pang every time she remembered his death. Every time she remembered letting that bullet loose from its cage. She remembered with a stab of regret the moment when she had taken his life. _

_And yet, it was nothing to her. _

_Though she grieved, though she felt that stabbing pain, none of it mattered to her. She didn't feel anything. She didn't acknowledge the dangerous repercussions her depression was causing the universe, that black hole of an existence that balanced life with death. _

_Life and death. Simple analogies for complicated people. _

_Still, it didn't matter to them._

_They carried on as best they could, glancing away from the caked blood on their hands, their fingers glimmering with the taste of a life taken. _

_They carried on with him watching from above, his cautious eye wandering over the situation. He understood that with grieving, came pain, time, constraints, and also comfort in another's arms. _

_He saw this unfolding below him, and did not like it. _

* * *

It wasn't there anymore.

That spark, that fire for life. Gone. It was all gone. And for what? Some ridiculous game of throwing dice God decided to play with the universe? What was that saying, _God doesn't play dice with the universe_. Yeah, right. Like a hole in the head.

She laughed in ridicule. Hole in the head. Hole in _his_ head.

She remembered the splitting of his skin as the raging bullet plunged into his forehead, exploding like a bomb deep inside.

The polished wooden table in front of her spattered into life, laminated photos dropping down on the oak so hard it felt like an underwater explosion, where the ripples flung sheets of icy water out onto the dry land.

"Do these look familiar at all to you, Miss Davies?"

She glanced up at the sound of her name uttered quietly, accusingly. She stared at the photos. Blood. Human.

Shook her head, denied knowing. Denied everything. Denied the sound of her name.

The man fingered his gun, peeled away the sides of his jacket to reveal his piece. He scoffed, stifled a small, bemused laugh, and placed his palms flat on the table. He left sweaty imprints when he moved them.

"Witnesses recognised you and a man walking towards the crime scene moments before the killings," his gruff voice was accentuated slightly with a Southern drawl, "Anything you want to say to that?"

She looked up at him, her eyes dull with painful exhaustion, smouldering depression, and aching nausea. "I don't know anything about this."

The detective gave her a stern look, studied her with his dark, mysterious eyes, and flinched involuntarily as his lip gave way to an impulsive sneer. With his hands placed firmly over the edges of his bony hips, he offered her a final look before dismissing her, moving to leave the room.

"I'll let you contemplate over those photos," he stammered with an edge of frustration before leaving the dimly-lit, cluttered room.

Opened boxes lay strewn about the dusty floor, files spilling out, papers crinkled everywhere. Noticeboards overflowed with notes, poorly-written scrawls about notifications, different cases. It was all nothing to her. Just mess. Just rubbish in a deeply upset world of unfair life and peaceful death.

Once again, her eyes moved back towards the photos, those distortions of a reality that she had purposely chosen to forget. He lay there, mattered and caked with his own blood. The smooth concrete stones beneath him were stained with the crimson liquid that leaked from himself, and his own father, laying beside him. The two looked peaceful, yet strained with the darkness death had finally brought them. One, who had been so far gone it was clear he no longer possessed a soul, had a wry smile plastered on his youthful, yet slightly wrinkled features. The other, older and more strained from the demands of life, wrought a distressed presence among the witnesses to the deaths. He bled openly through the gaping wound in the back of his head, his neck slippery with dark beads of crimson. His expression was one of utter surprise, and fear of the unknown. He had not known what would happen once he had crossed that blurred line of life and death.

The photos were tremendously clear, glazed in a plastic cover of laminate. They told of the scene with unhindered clarity, and yet those who had taken the photos had not witnessed the desperation of the younger one's last moments, those struggles between the dead and the living, those breeches of the lost soul that could only watch from above as his host body self destructed.

Tru cringed, convulsed impulsively, looked away. She could not relive it. Not this time.

She had taken a life and its aftertaste tasted so sickly sweet she did not trust herself to look at another human, for fear she would lose it all.

It had taken a while to come to trust in the one other person who plainly understood her pain and drowning depression. He understood everything, she knew. He dealt with death every day. He _was_ death.

Jack Harper could only stand back and watch as Tru suffocated with the wrath of her guilt, with the ravishing desire to relish in the taking of another life. He had known back then, with her sobbing and convulsing in his bed, her arms draped over his taut shoulders and her resistance to let go, that she would break, that she would not be able to handle the pounding pressure death ensued in those who harboured it.

He had known, and yet did nothing to stop it.

Although his utter resistance to admit to it, a part of him, the darkest part, the part rotting his soul, wanted Tru to uncover the truths about death, and relish in them. To be a part of them, even. To completely lose herself in the ecstasy of death, and the thrill of the killing.

Tru could trust him. She knew it. She felt it deep in the hollows of her heart, her soul.

She could trust Jack Harper with her life.

* * *

He knew she couldn't trust him. Not after everything he had done. Not after the careful, flawless way he had arranged the bodies in such a way that it would be deceptive to the naked eye. Not after the lies that poured from his mouth like vermin down an alleyway.

He remembered. He remembered everything; every painfully clear detail of the night's events.

How beautiful she had looked in that dress, how flawless and defined she had been with that shower of cobalt draping over her.

The painful, disapproving looks her father gave him as he had continued to stare shamelessly at her tanned skin.

The beating heart, the pounding in his chest as he wrapped his hands around the gun without so much as a mild hesitation.

Blood, everywhere. Wounds, though not from his own gun; hers smoked with a wicked satisfaction while the body lay in a heap on the ground.

"Do these look familiar to you at all, Mr. Harper?"

Without looking at the arrogant, flustered, sneering detective, Jack almost scoffed at the sheer ignorance of the Southern man. The photos were clear, deserving of attention, and extremely surreal, though reality settled in the pit of Jack's stomach. However surreal the photos seemed to be, they were very much real.

He remembered.

He gazed his eyes over the glossy pictures, their words speaking more than any voice could. The bodies, laying a couple of steps away from one another, the gun still smoking on the ground, fingertips reaching out to its metal tip. Blood everywhere, splattered, pooling, spilling. Oozing.

It was all real, Jack knew. He had been there. He had arranged both father and son that way. He had been prepared to kill the son without a soul for the greater good. Kill in cold blood. Murder.

In the end, that sweetly numbing end, she had pulled the trigger, fire streaming from the lip, exploding in the centre of Jensen's forehead. Killing him instantly. The way his body should have died, along with his soul, all those months ago.

That was now but a distant memory, Jensen's initial death. The death that grabbed his soul, stole it from him. The events to begin it all.

Finally, Jack brought himself back to reality just enough to conjure up a reply. "Should they look familiar to me, Detective?"

The detective didn't hesitate to scoff. "Your fingerprints were found on the gun, Mr. Harper."

"Please," Jack interrupted with a falsely polite voice, "call me Jack."

Impatience wearing on him, the detective slammed his palms down on the wooden table in front of him, leaned over, and glared at the man before him. "Cut the game, Mr. Harper. There is sufficient evidence against you in this case, and if you don't cooperate, we are going to have to assume the worst."

Folding his hands together while leaning his elbows unceremoniously on the table, Jack feigned a look of concern, before tilting his head sadistically, eyes cold. "You do know what they say about the word 'assume', don't you? When you assume, you make an as-"

"Don't say another word unless you want me to cuff you right now," the detective interrupted coldly before smirking arrogantly, "I could have that arranged."

Swallowing a lump in his throat, Jack forced himself to sigh and think with rationality. "Jensen Ritchie and I were acquainted, make no mistake of that. But don't think for a second that just because you found my supposed print on his gun that he wasn't the monster you want so desperately to deny."

The detective was silent, forced into stunned surprise at Jack's hard wisdom.

Seeing a glimmer of fear in the man's eyes, Jack continued with his cold, unforgiving voice. "Jensen Ritchie was responsible for several brutal murders of young women. That fact itself was proven by his testament to his father early on that night. That was why the son killed the father."

It was common knowledge an anonymous call to the police that night had been made about the killings before the murder of the good doctor. It was released to the public, along with a report of the murders of the young women, and mentioned in the article had been the name of the assailant. Jensen Ritchie, a medical student at Hudson University.

Jack continued. "You call my fingerprint sufficient evidence, when your case for justice is laying in plain sight. Guilt is a terrible thing, Detective. I'm sure it ate away at Jensen Ritchie like a cancer."

Boldly, the detective replied sternly, "And you would know all about that."

Unfazed, and completely at ease, Jack relaxed his features, leaned back in his chair, and smiled up at the detective, his voice still hard as stone, "Before you go chasing ghosts, Detective, look at the evidence first before you decide what is and isn't sufficient. Then maybe you will discover how much time you have wasted chasing me down."

Sliding his chair back with a pitched screech, Jack stood and wandered over to the unlocked door of the interrogation room, reaching for the handle before turning back fleetingly. "If that was all…"

Jack shuddered on the inside when he felt the calm rush of the cool air over his face. He looked around and could not help but feel guilty. Behind locked doors, he knew innocent people were being tied to guilty charges. And he could do nothing but feel guilty.

No, he knew Tru couldn't trust him. Not after everything.

* * *

She sighed once she left the cluttered room. She looked around, shuddered on the inside, and cleared her mind.

She stopped. Stared. Froze.

He did the same.

Their eyes met. There was a space between them, a large gap where crimson carpet grew underfoot. They stood there, watching each other.

Tru looked away first. She couldn't take it. Not again. She couldn't disguise her hatred towards the agony of desire between them. It was painful; it ached deep within the soul.

Jack was forced to look down. It was too much to bear, that painful agony of unspoken words, of feelings too shameful to speak of.

They walked away, the two of them staggering towards the exit of the building, each down opposite paths.

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**A/N: Again, hopefully that made sense in the way I wanted it to ;) Please review and offer feedback, as I live for that sort of thing :)**

**Peace.**


	2. Reinforcement

**A/N: Me again, bringing you another chapter of the sequel to _Blood of a Stranger_. What I wanted to accentuate the most in this story is the absolute _helplessness_ Tru feels, even though she knows she has been called by a higher power to essentially "help" people. I wanted to express her downward spiral in a way that would forsake her calling completely. I have an ulterior motive for this, but will not give it away yet ;)**

**Anyway, thanks to the fabulous people who reviewed the first chapter and hopefully this one will have a little more substance than the last. **

**Disclaimer: I forgot to put up a disclaimer in the first chapter so this will have to suffice. I do not own Tru Calling, or any of its characters. Everything belongs to its respective owner.**

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**Aftermath  
****Chapter Two: Reinforcement**_

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_He saw her, broken and breathing intensely. Soft tendrils of her dark hair were plastered to her sticky forehead, mattered and dripping with a sweat that she imagined was tainted red. He saw everything. He saw her pain, her denial, her numbing depression, her spiral down, deeper into that dark place he himself had found. He saw it all. _

_And he also watched as she persisted, drank life into her, grasping on to the edge of something she so desperately wanted to be real. _

_He saw, idly amused, as her hand moved along the railing, fingers lightly caressing the smooth, metal edges of a boundary that rippled with her every breath. _

_He knew she was slipping. Yes, soon, very soon, she may well choose to be with him again, peaceful in that place of hollow white. That place of eternal grace._

There but for the grace of Tru go I.

_He remembered his own words, littered and dripping with a clarity that wandered deep inside of him, to eventually pull everything out and expose them from the outside. _

_He had been ripped apart; mind, body and soul, and placed in a land so far away from what he craved that it soon became apparent what would happen. He would have to be torn apart, limb from terrified limb, until nothing remained. _

_Until he no longer possessed those reinforcements that kept his body whole. _

_And now, as he looked absently down on her shaky form, he realised that she too did neither possess the qualities that kept life alive, nor her own reinforcements._

_And, he knew, soon enough, she would be ripped apart, too. Limb from limb, blood from blood, until nothing remained. _

* * *

Her eyes moved steadily across the metallic table. The pound of flesh lying motionless on the slab seemed to stare back at her, eyes glazed over and missing that vital gleam. That spirit. That _soul_.

She ran her fingers lightly over the flesh, never flinching as the cold body froze her fingertips. She noticed silently the glue that held the body together; the thread that wove around the body's many limbs, around its organs, spun together the blood from the beating heart.

Nothing in this world was indestructible; nothing could ever _not_ be destroyed. Everything could ultimately be separated from itself.

Tru thought about how easily it had been to destroy a life.

With ease, she remembered the way she had held the gun in her shaking hands, finger gripping the trigger.

She remembered how one simple pull of a single finger had ripped open his head, exposing a wound and the blood that followed.

She remembered the seams of his makeup, the thread that had woven him together, and how they split apart, ripping open his body and tearing it apart.

Jensen had been sown together by glue; a _reinforcement _that had only held the body together. The soul had already been lost. There was no glue for the soul.

* * *

Jack shifted uncomfortably in the leather-coated chair. He hated confrontations. He hated feeling like a prisoner, even with the creature comforts the macabre office seemed to offer. And he hated being pampered, being groomed and fed the fear that would sober him. When he heard the door swing open, he refrained from straightening in his chair. Instead, he leaned further into the smooth back of the cool leather, hands clasped firmly on the arms of the chair.

"Jack," a man's voice echoed through the office, scathing, yet not quite scolding, "I thought you said there would be no complications. What happened?"

Even though it pained him so much, even though it was sizzling on the tip of his tongue, he knew he couldn't say it. "Richard, I'm sorry." He paused and sighed falsely. "I guess I just didn't concentrate hard enough."

The cold, grey eyes of Richard Davies glared hard into Jack's falsely earnest blue orbs. "You were sloppy. You left gaping holes in the evidence. And you involved the police."

Jack pinched his eyes closed, numbing the bridge of his nose with two fingers. "They had to find the bodies before anyone else did. I couldn't afford involving witnesses."

"If I recall correctly, Jack," Richard spoke with an even tone, though he forced an undercurrent of blame, "this was your responsibility. You told me you had everything under control, that you could handle it. So what went wrong?"

With a slight nod of his head, Jack sighed, this time out of silent frustration. He wanted to. He wanted to tell the truth. But how could he? Glancing at the hard eyes of his mentor, Jack felt a chill as he thought ironically how similar this 'meeting' was to an interrogation.

Bringing himself back to the room, Jack shook his head. "I've never killed anyone before."

The absolute truth to that quiet statement was completely lost on Richard. "It is your job to kill people, Jack. You end lives. If what you're telling me is that you hesitated because you didn't want to kill him, you should have thought about that before you agreed to this job."

Jack lowered his eyes, staring at the ground. "I didn't agree to this job; it agreed to me."

"Get used to it," Richard snapped as he glowered at Jack. "You will have to do more than simply shoot someone in this line of work."

Richard still believed that Jack had been the one to shoot Jensen. Jack had purposely failed to relay the revelation that Tru herself had been the one to fire the bullet from its cage. And Jack wanted it to stay that way.

Jack pressed his lips together, glancing up at Richard through shuttered eyes. "Trust me, I know what I signed on for."

Blinking, the hardened face of Richard Davies peered down at his littered desk, hands rifling through papers. He stopped when he found what he was looking for. He flicked his eyes over the black, printed words and cleared his throat with forced conviction. He glared at the paper, then over at Jack, who sat waiting for his sentence.

"Jack," Richard began in a patronising tone, "this is going to cost you."

Jack considered those words. Those dreaded words that he wished would never leave anyone's mouth, if only to relieve him of the crawling fear reaching out to the pit of his stomach. He wondered for a fleeting moment what exactly it was Richard was going to make him do, though that wonder dissipated when he realised there wasn't anything he wasn't willing to do.

"I don't care," Jack's still voice breeched the short silence, "just make it go away."

* * *

The morgue was quiet. It always seemed to be, these days. There was barely a sound. Not even the metallic grinding of a gurney being wheeled into the autopsy room. It was sanitary, sterile. Clean.

Davis tightened the waist of his lab coat, pulling it close to his body. It was cold, the day outside recovering from the wintry conditions that had only passed a few weeks ago, though the new season was well into motion. He held a clipboard in one hand, flimsy cup of cold coffee in the other.

Pushing the white doors open carelessly, he failed to notice just how far they swung apart. He failed to notice many things of late.

Just like he failed to notice the presence of a woman, hidden within shadow and without movement. He walked right on by, never even offering the effort to notice his surroundings.

He stopped at the stable gurney, the dull body pressed firmly against its cold surface. The body was a depressed shade of blue, with dark lines circling the rims of its eyes. Its cheeks had drawn a hollow within its face, the flesh sunken and taut around the bone.

"Complications during heart surgery," a voice sounded in the room, a deep monotone. "Doesn't seem fair. He was so young."

Davis started, suddenly sucked back into real life. "Tru, what are you doing here?"

Tru stepped from the shadows of the room, her face a mask of living death. Her eyes were swollen, red-rimmed and oddly hollow, and her lips were parched, dry from the constant attention she was giving them with her moist tongue. She licked her lips again, fleetingly painting life into them, before they died again.

She shrugged, her shoulders barely lifting. "I work here."

Swallowing at the harsh light Tru shed on herself by wallowing in the darkness, Davis frowned slightly. "You're on sick leave. Indefinitely. Remember?"

Tru dropped her eyes to the ground, shame hiding itself between guilt and desperation. "Couldn't stay away."

Davis sighed, lunging breath deep into his chest. He smeared a hand across his temples. "Tru, you need to. For everyone's sake. You need to take some time off."

She frowned, a painful stab of remembrance piercing into her mind. "Davis, I-"

…_she laid a pale hand over the painted wood, white fingers paling black pine. Her other hand felt heavy, like something were holding it down. She looked at it absently, barely noting his fingers laced with hers. _

_She looked to his face, hope fluttering within her. Her heart fell when she found herself staring into the tender blue eyes of Jack Harper. _

_He squeezed her hand supportively, then glanced at the coffin. _

_Jensen's lifeless body lay buried in there, behind the shine of the lid and the stains of the white rose petals._

_Tru let a single tear fall from her face and splash onto the black pine…_

…Davis' eye mirrored concern as he peered at Tru, his voice clearly worried. "Tru, is everything okay?"

Her eyes flicked to his. Everything around her faded, her surroundings drowning beneath her. She shook her head, eyes deathly void. "Nothing's okay."

* * *

The music was enough to lull her into a soothing stupor, if not for the clear voice in her head that reminded her again and again of her job. She was to watch him, apparently. Not that she didn't understand Richard's clear, decisive point to reinforce Jack, to make sure he was playing the game; she just never imagined stalking would cross her path. No, it wasn't stalking. It was _watching. _There was a clear distinction.

Or so Carrie thought.

She sat heavily in shadow, in one of the far corners of the bar, every once and a while sucking down her beer. And she watched. She watched the way he sunk into the stool while hunching over the wooden counter. She watched as his fingers never unfurled around the glass; he kept them curled tightly against the faceted crystal of ember liquid. She watched his eyes burn through until they could no longer recognise their surroundings. She watched him mourn the loss of something he never had.

She watched into the early hours of the morning.

The music seduced her into a trance. Its soft beats and haunting melody pounded softly, like the patter of rain on a windowpane, against her pulse. It didn't make any sense to her, but she didn't care. She didn't care why the music continued to seduce her.

She just watched.

Her eyes barely widened in surprise when she found him staring at someone. His face was turned, shadows casting a glare onto his cheek, and his eyes were settled intensely on someone. He didn't move as he watched. He did not need to blink. He just watched.

Carrie followed his gaze, moving her eyes across the room tentatively as she searched. Then she stopped searching. The pulse of the softly pounding music ceased as her ears became deaf.

Jack Harper moved from his stool, feet stumbling beneath him as he attempted to place them steadily on the ground.

Tru Davies never moved. She just stood there, across the room from her destined opposite, and stared at him. It wasn't that she saw him, however. But rather, she saw _through_ him. She saw through the stumbling, drunken fool, through the hardened killer that tasted blood, through the caged animal forced to do unwilling bidding. She saw through to the broken man that despised the loneliness of his life and craved nothing more than a chance at life.

She saw through to the man that hated his death-stained life.

The music breathed into Tru as she hesitated, eyes returning to life as she recognised reality.

Jack fumbled with his jacket as he tried to pry it from the back of his stool, panicking as he watched Tru collide with the crowd and escape hastily.

All the while Carrie watched. She watched with certainty as Jack placed a weary hand over his face and collapsed back onto the wooden stool that neither she, nor Richard, knew the complete story.

Something had happened, something traumatic and haunting, for both Jack and Tru that they would never quite recover from.

And this concerned Carrie. She knew it would also concern Richard, when she later reported all that she had seen.

* * *

The steaming coffee streamed steadily from the burning pot as Tru watched with lazy eyes. Any sign of life had long disappeared from her dappled brown orbs, and as they stated ahead of her, she found herself wondering if it were possible to be living death.

She had always felt an ironic sense of security in her father's office. Even with the displayed katana swords crossing paths on a wooden pedestal, placing a foreboding sense of war into her blood, she still felt safe. She still felt like her father would wrap his arms tightly around her and whisper words of comfort.

Even if he hadn't done that since forever. She couldn't remember a time when he had.

Richard watched as his daughter wrapped her fingers around the steaming mug of bitter coffee. He lowered himself down onto the suede couch, leaving only a small gap between their bodies.

She looked battered, like she had not slept for weeks. Her eyes were rimmed with dark circles, not unlike deep bruising, and her face was long and withered. He worried about her.

Even if his problem had gone away if only to sacrifice her sanity.

Her lips pressed against the rounded rim of the ceramic mug, her mouth stinging with singeing heat as the hot liquid slid down her throat.

Richard lifted a careful hand to her face, stroking the side of her forehead as he lifted disobedient curls of dark hair from her eyes.

He cleared his voice, the hesitation fading away within an instant. "Tru, your friend Jack came to see me a couple of days ago. He told me what happened with that boy, Jensen."

There was no recognition in Tru's face. No reaction, not even a lift of her eyes. She just stared forward.

"Tru," Richard's voice of hardened silk breeched through to her again, "Jack told me how he killed Jensen. He said the two of you found Jensen with a gun, standing over his father. Jack said Jensen had threatened you so he took the gun and shot him."

_That wasn't what happened. It didn't go like that. Jack did not kill Jensen. I did_.

The words didn't come, no matter how many times Tru thought them.

Richard moved his hand to squeeze her shoulder supportively. "I want you to know, Tru, that no matter how bad this gets, I'm here for you. Both of you."

Tru finally found her voice, but what eventually escaped her was not what she wanted to say. "What will happen to Jack?"

Her father was silent, though he didn't need to be. He paused dramatically, feeding Tru the lie he needed her to believe. "Nothing. There is not enough evidence against him for a conviction. His lies are very convincing, especially to the police. If he finds himself in any trouble, I'll be there to pull him out of it."

_And what about me? Will you pull me out of it, as well? No. I'm already in too deep_.

Tru leaned in to her father's embracing arms, his tightly secure hug that tugged at her memory, her mind begging her to remember a time when he had done this before. But no memory came.

As his hand stroked her hair, as his lips moved in a whisper of comforting words, she closed her eyes and was still. The secure embrace shrouded her with a sweet lie that lulled her into sleep.

She would always feel secure in her father's office.

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**A/N: Just a quick note, remember that last line.**

**Reviews are appreciated, as always.**

**Until next time, peace :)**


	3. Mercy

**A/N: Hey all, I'm back. And just a warning, this chapter turned out pretty dark, for several reasons and without me really wanting it to be dark. Alas, I wanted to explore the relationship between Tru and Jack a little more, and why I have been keeping them apart for the last couple of chapters. Through flashbacks, I hope to answer that.**

**Thanks to those that kindly reviewed; your thoughts are appreciated more than you may think :)**

**Without further ado, on with the chapter.**

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**Aftermath  
****Chapter Three: Mercy**

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_Mercy was a word he had liked. He had placed mercy on a pedestal unlike any other. He always had been chivalrous; mercy was a warm comfort he would have given to anyone in need of it within a moment's heartbeat. But then, way back when, he possessed charity, goodness, kindness, warmth. And a soul. _

_A soul always seemed to make up the difference. _

_When he had died, the first time, his soul became lost. It didn't return as his body had. It remained in that place he so loved now, while his body became ravaged and stricken with inhuman craving for blood. _

_He killed without remorse, if only to feed his curiosity about the delicacy of the human life. There had also been the element of seeking the place beyond life; that place he had visited, briefly, before he was sucked back into life. Without mercy, it had seemed. _

_He had wondered back then, why did she choose who lived and who died? Why was she the voice of God, commanding and superior? What gave her the right to take him away from the comfort he had finally found?_

_But mercy became him after his body and soul found each other once again. He understood now, how intricate and beyond her abilities were. Her _calling _as she so often referred to it as. He no longer felt resentment at her for choosing him to live again. He felt mercy for her choice, as he did for her being, as well. _

_Perhaps he did not so mercifully accept her opposite; the man they called _Death

Death _himself had no mercy, no peace of mind, or heart, to give compassion to the weary. His only purpose in life now was to spread death in a stream of pure, black chaos. To render _Life_ useless in her path. _

Death _had no mercy._

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Every morning the black ink would seep further into his blood, poisoning him. He felt it prick and sting his back as he was reminded painfully of the time he had been too drunk to feel the ache. Years ago, now, he recalled distantly, ashamed to bear the mark of such a word he no longer felt he possessed. 

He was grateful for the foreign lettering, the inky paint strokes of a word not just anyone would understand in its cryptic passage.

Jack pressed a weary hand to his taut shoulder; it felt solid, not from muscle, but from exhaustion. He stared hard into the tall mirror that glinted skin before him. Void of a shirt, Jack stood motionless in front of the deceptive glass that may or may not be real.

He didn't know anymore.

With a heavy sigh and a tired grunt, Jack noticed wearily how empty a mirror truly was. Only painting a reflection; an image of something completely disposable, destructible, even. What about the indestructible? What about the pain, the sadness, and depression and everything else that could not be reflected in a mere image.

What about all of that? Where did that fit in?

Jack felt the dull aching of a hangover. Too much drinking; though not enough to ease the pain of memory.

He wanted to make things right, to reap mercy to those who needed it, to give back what he knew others deserved. He wanted to give life to the dying, a chance to the damned.

Remembering a time when he had given that chance many a time, Jack caught a lump in his throat. He tried to swallow it, tried to rid himself of its choking hold, but it wouldn't go away.

It would never go away, he knew. Not until he stopped listening.

That was his problem; he was always listening to the wrong voices.

The stabbing arrogance was a front; a façade forced upon his rugged face. The pure conviction was only words in his mouth.

He didn't want people to die. He wanted to give them mercy.

And he would always be reminded of that.

* * *

The untouched mug of coffee ceased to steam from the mouth as it grew cold in the sombre air. It rested on a coaster that was designed with an array of colours and flowers in full bloom. The beauty that was born from the desolate skeletons of winter. 

Tru didn't notice the beauty even as she stared at the coaster. All she saw were dull colours bleeding together in a sad portrait of something dead.

The diner was abuzz with activity, as it always was in the early morning, with the workers bustling to grab their coffees off the counter, or couples enjoying a lazy dawn while digging into a generous breakfast.

She didn't notice.

Even though she plastered on a false sense of security, Tru was finding it increasingly difficult to forge a smile, especially to those closest to her. Even to her own brother.

Harrison waved a careless hand in front of his sister's face, whistling quietly to her still form. "Tru? Earth to Tru. Incoming call from planet Harrison…"

She flicked her eyes to his face, recognition breaching through a void stare. "Sorry, I wasn't listening. Long night."

With two curved fingers, Harrison scratched the rough surface of his chin where thin stubbles of dark hair grew. "Aren't they all. Anyway, I wanted to talk about Dad."

Their usual padded booth was hard against Tru's back as she shifted, glancing wearily at the cold toast before her. She hadn't touched it. "What about Dad?"

Harrison shrugged casually, the folds of his shirt crinkling with the sudden motion. "I don't mean to sound ignorant or anything, but lately Dad's been a little preoccupied. I tried talking to him the other day, you know, son to father, but he blew me off. I thought he gave me this job so we could get to know each other more, but now I'm thinking…"

"Harrison," Tru interrupted harshly, creasing her eyebrows, lowering her look, "just because Dad's not interested in you doesn't mean he doesn't care. He probably has a lot on his mind at the moment. And, I mean, don't we all?"

Blinking, Harrison moist his lips nervously. He had noticed his sister's change in behaviour, the slight nausea every morning, the loss of appetite, and the hunger for darkness. "Tru, I know you've been through a lot over the last few weeks, but you're not letting me in. I want to help but I don't know how to."

Sighing in mock frustration, Tru gripped the underside of the table. "You don't have to. I'm fine. And I'm trying to get on with my life, so could you please not mention this again."

Harrison knew she wasn't fine. Harrison knew his sister had not slept in days. Harrison knew his sister was drinking incessantly. Harrison knew his sister was slipping.

And Harrison knew he could do nothing to help her.

He glanced down to her plate of toast. Untouched. He ran his tongue over his teeth in thought before dismissing his concerns. Leave them for another day. "Are you going to eat that?"

She shook her head and pushed the plate along the table. It stopped in front of Harrison, and he glanced at her one last time, before slicing the cold toast with a blunt knife.

* * *

The white room was quiet. Placid and sterile in the afternoon's daze of comfortable silence. The utterance of an occupant of the otherwise empty room stuttered into life as he examined human tissue with bloodied pliers. His dark hair seemed electrified, shocks of soft spikes shooting up. His white lab coat flailed behind him as he marched towards a small pool of water collected in a bowl. He dipped the pliers into the water, immediately staining it a murky red. Holding the pair of small scissors to his eyes, he noted the dripping droplets of crimson water and watched as the pale matter split with moisture. 

The double doors swung open suddenly to reveal a flustered young women, her hair in tatters, her clothes disdained. Tossing her head back in frustration, she turned to her accomplice with bitter eyes.

"She's not here," she spoke with an angry tone, upset and flustered, "she never signed in this morning."

The young man carefully lowered his pliers, gripping the edge of his glasses and pulling them away from his face. "Are you sure? Maybe she could have…"

"Tyler," the flustered women interrupted fiercely, "I've checked with everybody. She didn't come in today."

Tyler's eyes lowered darkly, his look descending into sadness. "Ave, it's been three weeks. I know we took our time off, but this is bad. I don't think she's coming back."

Avery fought tears. She fought them really hard. Bringing a hand to her face, she smoothed the gentle blonde curls from her eyes. "I've left her a couple of hundred messages. Hasn't returned even one of them."

"I know," Tyler breathed with shaky breath, "the last time I saw her was at the funeral."

…_pale white roses sighed in the heavy rain as the deep ebony of the coffin seemed to run with the cold droplets of water. His hair was mattered, dripping cold, but he didn't care. Nothing seemed to matter anymore. Not at a time like this._

_He saw her there, an image painted in mourning black, dark hair strangling either side of her neck as she stood still. She looked as dead as the inside of the coffin was…_

…Avery took a step towards the laboratory table, where implements lay about, messy and intrusive. Intricate splatters of blood were drying like ash on the solid surface of the marble. Tyler stood in front of her, hands clasping the edges of the cold table.

Shrugging, Tyler began to collect the bloodied implements, dumping them unceremoniously into a steaming bucket beside him. "I think we should leave. It doesn't seem right. Not without her."

With a final look of pain towards the laboratory, Avery dug her hands into her white coat and strode towards the swinging doors. She too had often wondered if any of this seemed worth anything anymore. Without Jensen, the world seemed cruel and cold, foreign in the wake of his death.

And, like Tru, Avery didn't see the worth in trying anymore.

* * *

He was drinking again. A couple of hours short of midnight, Jack found himself sitting on the same stool, indulging in the same pounding music, and downing the same drink as any other night. The cool, thick liquid poured gently down his throat as he lifted his head to it, saluting in the dark of the lonely bar. The bartender stared worriedly, wondering if he should be doing something, anything, to stop a man from killing himself. 

But then, how could Death get any deader?

Jack dug his haughty laughter into the back of his throat, snuffling weakly in the horrid light. He hated what he had become. He hated being the way he was. And yet, when he reached the pinnacle of not caring, he found himself just floating above it; protesting to the world around him.

It didn't mean a thing to him. Not anymore. Nothing mattered; not the burning cold alcohol he shot through his blood, nor the growing feelings of an obsession with his rival. Those things didn't matter when he was drunk. They just left him, escaped his grasp and fluttered away into the night.

He wondered idly what she would be doing tonight.

He imagined, if only to warrant a taste of satisfaction. She would be alone, in her apartment, flicking through an old photo album of memories long turned to dust. Memories that hung loose through a noose in a gaping hole that opened her skin, exposed what was beneath. She would be fighting the tears that would not last long, pooling in the rims of her eyelids. They would fall, gently, softly, smearing her cheeks with salty sweet memories.

But then, what did he know? He couldn't even save her. He had no right to imagine.

It was nights like these, these increasingly haunting nights of pale emptiness, that Jack lost all compassion. Mercy left him, ink trickling from the skin of his back in thin leaks of black.

Nights like these, he truly was Death, in all its glory. He sought to wreak havoc; he sought to watch them all suffer to the bottom of their empty deaths. He sought bloody satisfaction in the bluntly aching heroics of dying souls.

He sought Life, just so he could torture her so.

Jack felt a draft through the bar, a rippling breeze that ripped through him as he turned to glance over his shoulder fleetingly. His eyes were blurry, drained of sufficient sight by the dull scotch.

When his eyes settled, and his sight focused, he could see her, wearing nothing but black as her hair dragged around her shoulders. Her eyes were as dark as night. She was empty.

She saw him, as she had not quite enough nights ago. Eyes darkening, Tru strode into momentary life, pushing through the crowd and escaping with a frustrated sigh.

Not unlike the other night, Jack fumbled in his stool, however this time he succeeded in grasping a hand through the crowd, stumbling through to the back door.

She walked briskly, possessed even still with grief and anger.

He followed her, losing her sometimes, then finding her again hiding in the dark shadows of the filthy alleyway. She crawled against the murky walls, stumbling over garbage in the dark of night.

Tiring eventually, she stopped, back rigid against the wall. Tru waited for Jack to find her, she waited for his piercing gaze and solid righteousness. She waited for him.

Jack slowed his mad stumbles, hands pressing flat against the wall, trapping her mercilessly. He breathed stale alcohol down onto her, intoxicating her with ripe fumes of dead memories.

Reminded starkly of the night they had both drunk too much, Tru tried to crawl into the wall, digging her fingernails into the crumpling concrete…

…_his lips were forceful, crashing down on hers in a drunken rage of twisting emotions. Trying to pry him off, he refused by running a hand down her side, clutching around her waist and pulling her towards him. _

_No longer safe in the sanctity of her own apartment, Tru felt a dark fear ripple through her menacingly. _

_Jack was kissing her furiously, not like he had the night she needed comfort, but this time he was rough, scratchy facial hair grating against the soft, pale skin of her cheek. _

_Even with his drunken kiss, she felt oddly at ease. Even though she fought him off, resisting him adamantly, she still felt an ache when his lips left hers. Even though they had been forceful and prying, she still felt as if they belonged on hers. _

_Tru eased him away from her, taking his hand and leading it away from her body. They stood apart, connected still by lifeless hands, hanging limp in front of them. He pulled apart, turned and left, apologising through pressed lips._

_He left her alone to deal with the cold absence of his dead lips…_

…and even after everything, she trusted him with her life. Hadn't he saved her from Jensen? Hadn't he let her crumple into his lap and cry until tears stained his shoulder when she had pulled the trigger? Hadn't he been there, time after time, watching her, protecting her from what she couldn't see?

Now, he rested his weary head on her heaving shoulder, tired and dizzy from the stale liquor. He breathed deep, taking in her scent that remained even still.

"I don't want it to be this way," he slurred uneasily, dangerously slipping away from her. "I want it to be different."

Tru sobbed, needless, dry sobs that never shed a tear. She convulsed on the inside, shivering and shaking with a numb pain that grew as she reached out to stroke the rough sides of his cheek.

"Jack," she spoke with a choked voice, "we killed a man."

Pausing, she tucked her thumb underneath his chin, lifting it so she could see his blurred eyes that couldn't settle.

Her whisper hung loosely in the air, haunting it until it dissipated into the dry night, "We don't get to come back from that."

* * *

**A/N: Hope that wasn't too dark for y'all :) Reviews are always appreciated.**

**Peace **


	4. Waiting

**A/N: Another chapter coming your way. I wanted to really show the scheming going on between Richard and Carrie, so there is one scene in this chapter that I think will ultimately set up a lot of the coming events in this story. Just to keep that in mind :)**

**Thanks again to those who reviewed my pervious chapter, and of course the chapters before. You guys are awesome and you all deserve medals ;)**

**Disclaimer: Again, I don't own anything but the words. **

**On with the show…**

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* * *

**

**Aftermath  
****Chapter Four: Waiting**

* * *

_He remembered waiting. He remembered the anxious dwelling on reasons, the flick of his gaze to his watch in uncomfortable impatience. He remembered sighing outwardly, exasperated and tired, eventually giving up. He remembered doing all of those things. For her._

_Waiting was a perpetual cycle, one that would never be broken. They would always be waiting. Waiting for hope, waiting for love. Waiting for a bus, or a train. Waiting for each other. Whatever the reason, people would always be waiting. _

_He watched _Death _wait for _Life_. He watched as Jack Harper grew worried, glanced to the clock beside him, shifted on the bed, and waited. He watched this all with a pang of jealousy, one he was not able to place so easily. _

_It did hurt him, to see _Life _so defenceless in the arms of her opposite. Though _Death _was not her lover, he did wait for her as a lover would. Incessant, restless, anxious. _

_He watched on from above, silently hoping _Life _would not allow this forbidden merging with _Death_. He hoped she would know enough not to entangle herself with _Death_. He hoped she knew enough to be aware that if their bodies gave in, if they entwined gently with a lover's embrace, nothing would be the same. Chaos would creep further, treading heavily over everything Fate wanted kept apart. _

_He knew nothing would ever be the same again, if forbidden intimacy was explored, if love grew between these forces of equal power. _

_Nothing._

_And so he waited. Waited for that collision, that bridging of a gap longing to be sewed at the seams. He waited with a nervous anticipation, for whatever was brewing, could not bring the world any balance. For surely, whatever was coming, was going to spill chaos and disorder in its wake. It was going to leave things destroyed in ruins. It was going to desolate the balance._

_And he waited._

* * *

Jack was always waiting. He had always been waiting. Waiting for a chance. Waiting for salvation. Waiting for someone to remind him everything was okay. Waiting for someone.

Anxiety tugged at him like a taut rope. It pulled him in, embraced him tightly so he could not escape. Jack felt the nausea creep over him, fading him into the darkness of the corner in which he sat, motionless.

He sat on the edge of her bed, waiting. With his thumbs furled deep into the pocket his hands made when they pressed together, Jack thought uneasily about why she was keeping him waiting. Why wasn't she with him, like she said she would be? Why hadn't she come home, been home even, since that morning? What was keeping her?

Nerves rode on the backs of the questions that bombarded him. He couldn't help but feel powerless, even though he had every rightful power in his grasp.

Jack turned to the digital clock flashing red numbers at him. It read just before twelve. Midnight.

And still Tru kept him waiting.

He didn't know why. Perhaps she was avoiding him, like she had done the last couple of weeks. Ever since Jensen had been murdered by her hands.

No, that wasn't right.

She had been willing to fall into his arms, cry uncontrollably, stain his shirt with tears, after she had killed Jensen. No, this wasn't all about Jensen. This was about the night they had both finished a bottle of tequila between them, downing each glass with a knowing look. This was about the night he had forced his lips down on hers, pressed himself against her so she fought hard against the wall behind her.

This was about him, Jack knew. It wasn't about Jensen.

He had apologised. Before seemed like an eternity ago. It was probably only a couple of hours since he had knelt beside her, grasping her hand, promising her with his own lips that everything would be okay.

But she hadn't come back yet.

And he was still waiting.

* * *

The morgue whistled with a decaying emptiness. Nothing seemed to be alive. There was no sign of life; just the dreary, weary corpses lying dormant in their cold, steel drawers. It wasn't always this way. There was once a time, she remembered, when life filled the stale air with a vibrancy that seemed so old now. So embarrassing, so naïve in the wake of all that had happened.

She should have known; she surrounded herself with death, dealt with it every day. Why hadn't she seen this? Why had she been so blind to this inevitable collision of Fate?

Once, the sanitary morgue had been a sanctuary, a place where reality could drip away, where her worrying dread would disappear. She had invested herself in these people's lives, working tirelessly, sometimes more than twenty four hours a day, just to give them another chance. Back then, she didn't have to worry about drinking herself into a catatonic state. She didn't have to worry about the growing intensity of the relationship she shared with the one person she was supposed to truly hate. That was then, though. And this was now.

Davis inched. He always did whenever he was nervous. He inched away from her, his shuffling feet and rustling white coat scratching away the silence between them. Tru stared at him, this man she used to know as Davis, friend, trustee, employer. Now he was just a body. Just another body among many others.

The cold steel against her back etched into her skin. She felt it prickle, ache against her already raw flesh. She remained where she was. It didn't matter to her how uncomfortable or disquieted she was anymore. None of it mattered.

"Physical life isn't everlasting, Tru," Davis spoke in a quiet voice, his feet no longer shuffling in discomfort. He had finally found stable ground. "No matter what we want to believe, we all have to die. It's the order of the world. If we didn't die, the universe would be thrust into chaos."

Tru kept her eyes down; the dull fire in them dying in the night's drowning calm. "It already is possessed by chaos. This world, this place…there's no hope. I think we lost that a while ago."

"Or," Davis sucked in sharp breath, expelling cool air as he breathed through his teeth, "maybe you just lost it. I think that this, what you're going through, didn't start with Jensen. I think it started with your mother."

Shrugging with as much effort she could muster with her back pressed up against the solid drawers, Tru lifted her head enough to capture Davis' look of concern. "Maybe."

"You lost her at such a young age, and even if you didn't know it then, it has haunted you ever since."

Tru thought of that word. _Haunted_. It lingered in her mind's pocket, collecting stale images and drowning whispers. She was haunted. She could feel it.

Davis continued steadily, careful not to break that precious boundary between two little and too much, "And then Luc. His death brought out another side of you. You weren't going to lose anyone else to Jack. Not like that."

"But I killed Jensen," Tru finished what her mentor had begun, her train of thought running along the tracks at dangerous speeds, "I killed him. Jack didn't. That's the difference. That's what makes it harder. If Jack had pulled the trigger, I could just hate him for it. That would be so much easier than this."

Her tone was dead, though her heart pumped blood furiously. She could _hear _her pulse through her flesh. She knew she wasn't dead.

Davis swallowed, gently approaching her with tentative steps. "Tru…"

"I did this," her voice cracked. Trails of choking anguish leaked from her. "I killed him, Davis. I created a monster, and I had no choice but to kill him. I don't kill people, Davis, that's not who I am. I'm life. I give _life. _I don't do this."

A single sob echoed through the room. It faded quickly.

"I don't do this."

* * *

"This is what we do. We end lives that are no longer meant to be alive."

"Something occurred to me," her sultry voice flowed from her. Carrie sat straight in the leather chair, her arms draped over the smooth sides. "Jack died once. That's how all of this started, right?"

Richard Davies ran two of his splintered fingers down the edge of an unsheathed sword. It glistened in the dank light of the rounded lamp. "We went over this, remember?"

Frowning, Carrie pulled a hand from its comfortable slouch to relieve her face from the irritable scratching of her dark hair. "Jack does to others what should have happened to him. He shouldn't be alive. He preaches the deaths of those who defy fate. And yet, he was once one of them."

"What are you suggesting, Doctor Allen?" Richard mocked sarcastically her with a stern undertone. "We kill Death?"

She watched his sword's gleam dance in the poor light. "He's not playing the game, Richard. I saw him with her. He's falling for her."

There was silence. For a time, it remained.

Richard considered this, irony slicing through his skin, tearing at the shreds of his barely beating heart. "Do you know why I married her mother?"

It wasn't a question made to be answered.

"It wasn't because I loved her, or because I admired her," Richard paused, piercing the threshold of the sheath, and slicing the sword back into its grave. "It was because I was drawn to her."

Carrie took a steady breath. "How does that help our cause? I mean, look how you turned out."

"Careful, Doctor," Richard took a step, placed his sword onto its carved rack, and turned towards Carrie with a dangerous look, "wouldn't want there to be an accident."

Silence remained once again.

Unfazed by Richard's idle threat, Carrie stared ahead, perched in the chair like a bird stalking its prey. "We need to do something about this. I'm sure you won't like your daughter being taken advantage of. Although, not really much of a stretch, is it?"

"They say patience is a virtue," his smooth voice carried with it the edge of a broken man, long suffering. "Mine has almost expired. This problem with Jack, take care of it."

Her face brightened with a smile. Carrie Allen was brewing a storm among her thoughts. "Gladly."

* * *

Davis watched her retreat, sadness creeping over his worn features, fatigue stretching across his face wearily. Grief was natural; it was expected. It was a necessary part of the healing process, one that needed to mend the broken parts of the human emotional skeleton. But this, whatever it was, was certainly not grief. This was a deep, drowning depression. This was a resignation; a giving up on life. A vicious cycle that dealt Tru a cruel hand every time.

Her mother.

Luc.

Jensen.

It never ended. Not for her.

Davis watched with concerned eyes as Tru stumbled into the elevator, not bothering to meet Carrie's eyes as they met briefly while exchanging a step over that barrier between stability and refined gravity.

Carrie stepped with a stab of her heels from the elevator, glancing at Tru with a brief frown, before finding Davis – her Davis – staring. At nothing, seemingly. Though, Carrie knew what he _had _been staring at. That lost girl, the one too old to be young, yet who harboured a broken innocence. Though, Carrie knew, Tru had outgrown youth long ago.

Long before Tru herself had even known it.

Yes, Fate played a part in how things turned out. That was no secret. But it wasn't about whether Fate was to blame; it wasn't even about whether Fate even existed. For most, it was a question of belief.

_Do I believe in Fate?_

_Do I want to believe in Fate?_

_Can I accept that there are forces out there among us that are stronger than anything else?_

_Can I accept that I do not control my life; that my destiny lies in the arms of Fate?_

It always came back to belief. To faith. And it didn't matter the subject, or the circumstance. Belief was everything.

Davis didn't turn away when Carrie pressed her lips lightly against his. He didn't flinch, didn't even feel a blush. There was nothing. He just continued to stare out to the whitewashed walls, the clean tile and the sanitary smells of forced cleanliness.

His pure white lab coat clung tightly to his body, while beneath his façade, his faded blue shirt was wrinkled and worn loosely, a tan coffee stain outlining the threads of his collarbone.

He was still waiting even as Carrie took his hand in her own, and led him quietly into his cluttered office. He was still waiting for Tru to walk back in, full of life and excitement, clutching the joys of her existence tightly in her hand.

Still waiting.

Davis expelled a distraught sigh and slouched into his black leather chair, hunching over the arms with his own. "I don't know what to do, Carrie. I-I just…I can't think anymore. Everything's so unclear that I don't even know where to go from here."

"Grief is always unclear," Carrie began, a slight authoritative voice patronising the uncomfortable silence between them. "It affects different people in different ways. Not everyone cries to begin with; some people remain numb for a time. Some people remain normal; they get on with their lives as if nothing has happened. Others, grief comes quickly; painfully, but quickly."

Letting his hands fall from the edges of his face, Davis into her dark eyes. "And Tru? What about her grief?"

Dropping her hands to her sides, Carrie leant casually against the side of the wooden desk, sincerity clutching her suddenly. She was no longer the Mole; she was the Grief Counsellor. "She's drowning in it. Something that horrific, something forced upon her without being able to do anything about it, knowing she created a monster in Jensen…that's taken something out of her. Something she doesn't know how to get back."

"What will happen to her?"

Carrie moistened her suddenly parched lips with the tip of her tongue. She stared straight at Davis as she continued in a hushed voice, "She'll grieve, eventually. It will all come down on her. But until it does, she will remain in this state of denial. She'll be numb until she isn't."

Davis forced himself to swallow. "How long will that take?"

There was silence. They both waited for it to be broken, but it never was.

* * *

A growing anxiety pinched the stark silence. The apartment was dark, clean, like no one lived there. Jack sat, keeping his body still, on the edge of the bed, eyes lowered towards the polished floorboards. She still hadn't come. Hours had passed, and yet her existence was void in her own apartment.

Jack heard the scratching of a key pressing deep into the door, and he sat up suddenly, eyes locked on the pathway to the door. Tru revealed herself slowly, ragged and tired, exhausted of all spirit and emotion.

She yawned, a tired motion forced upon her. It was like she didn't even notice. She kept her eyes down, afraid of what she might see in her mind's eye…

…_bloodstains painting her hands a sickly crimson, droplets spilling down onto her perfect cobalt dress. Her hands shook violently, her ragged fingers spread apart with disdained shock. They were caked with blood. Everything was. There was not a part of her unaffected by his blood. Everything was stained. Forever…_

…Jack stood cautiously from the bed, a creak wailing out as he did so. His hands rested quietly beside him, eyes searching in the dark.

She saw him there. She saw him and continued walking, eyes down.

Like a predator, Jack moistened his lips, breaking through the parched cracks and flowing life into them.

Like his prey, Tru stepped towards him, intrigued and drawn.

They stood close, so close that they could smell the want. The temptation. The danger of letting everything fade and slip away. They both knew that couldn't happen, for the sake of humanity. For the sake of the universe. For Fate, and all of its plans.

Jack found her eyes in the darkness, painting a prison around them and trapping her behind his walls.

"I waited," he spoke in a whisper.

There was barely time for her to respond, as Jack's lips came crashing down on hers, forceful and dangerous, yet tender and passionate.

And Tru waited. She waited for that time when she could give in, when everything would fade away and she would be her again. She waited, even as she kissed him with as much passion as he kissed her, for a chance to be free. For a chance to let go.

She waited.

* * *

**A/N: Fin. Please leave a review as they are appreciated and hopefully the next chapter will be up soon :)**

**Peace**


	5. Passion

**A/N: ****Too long since I've updated I know, but I had to really motivate myself to sit down and write this, not because I don't have any inspiration for this fic, but because things have been so hectic lately I honestly haven't had the time. So apologies for the lateness and I'll try not to let it happen again ;)**

**Without further ado, I'll skip straight into the chapter. Final notes will be made at the end.**

**Aftermath  
****Chapter Five: Passion**

_

* * *

_

_He watched, helpless. A spirit, forced to live a life of death. Forced to see. Forced to be reminded of all that he had left behind, all that he had not warned her of, all that he had not told her. And now, here she was, falling for the spell of _Death_. She, _Life_, born from all that offers chance, offers another life, was_ _giving in to _Death

_He knew it would happen. He knew, no matter the resistance between them, the defiance to never let this fatal combination happen, it would happen no matter what. He had seen it when he had been alive, beside her, watching her interact with this walking infection of death. He had seen the glimmer in _Death's_ eyes; the pure want and desperation in his look. _

_He had seen it all, didn't like it, cast it aside._

_But now, his death was still ripe in the air, still very much a reality, and he was not there to lead her away from the darkness. He was not there to help her, to steer her from the dangerous grasps of approaching _Death

_What was worse, she accepted _Death _now, like he was nothing. Like he had always belonged to her, entwined in an everlasting _Life. _But, he knew, _Life _and _Death _were never meant to collide, never meant to entwine. _

_For if they did, there was no telling what might happen._

_Rules were there for a reason. Trials and tribulations determined outcomes for a reason. It wasn't just an unfair advantage; it was an overseer to the overall results life produced. It was a balance, a pure truth between _Life _and _Death

_Separation was there for a reason._

_He knew this._

_He wasn't so sure she knew it. _

_She was submersed in both. And, it seemed, she couldn't tell the difference._

_She was neither living, nor dying._

_She was somewhere in between. _

* * *

She listened, she waited, she stood perfectly still as his lips forced themselves upon hers, no longer caring about the delicacy of her own precious balance between life and death. It felt good, to be caressed in such a way that she didn't even know about the difference. She was just somewhere in between, somewhere floating amongst euphoria and regret.

It didn't matter to her. None of it did. She didn't know why.

Jack pushed her against the wall, his mouth moving in hysteria. He had waited too long, seen too much, needed too much for his gaping hole to be filled in one night.

Still, it didn't matter.

He was caught up in passion, overtaken by the overwhelming sensation of completion. This was what he needed; this was what he had been searching for.

All he needed was her.

Tru didn't even feeling the pressing of the cement against her back as Jack pushed her further into it. She didn't hear the crack of plaster, or the creaking of polished floorboards. All she could seem to place was the beating of her chest, the drums of her pulse sounding over and over again, each time louder and faster, pounding her mind into oblivion.

She couldn't feel, couldn't place anything beyond that of her pulse.

Jack pulled back, his opened shirt exposing the flesh beneath it. His lips were red, swollen from anticipation. His eyes were drunk.

Tru didn't mind. She wasn't all there herself. Killing someone sort of did that to you.

His eyes fired rays of passion into hers. They heated the hearth, exploding it into flames of desire. She looked at him; that was all she could do.

She took his arm, outstretched his hand, hooked it onto her cheek. He stroked it affectionately, passionately. His touch was cold, his fingers dried from the long days of death. His body felt stiff, untouched, as she ran her own fingers slowly down the confines of his fine collarbone. The depths of his skin, hindered slightly by the stinging edge of his bone, seemed to speak to her.

She answered.

Peeling off his ragged shirt carefully, she pushed him onto her bed. He sat quietly on the edge, not daring to move any more. She leaned down, kneeling. With a hand laced around his neck, she brought her lips to his neck, caressing it with a drunken passion.

He flinched at the feeling. His body fluttered to life. Everything tingled with a numb cold. He didn't mind, though.

One of her hands trailed his body, curling around his neck, slipping down his shoulders, sliding along his chest. She felt the coarse hairs there and glanced a look at his eyes.

He looked straight into her. "This isn't right."

Jack felt her shirt, he felt balance colliding and changing. Nothing was going to be the same.

Tru touched her lips to his, softly. The calm before the storm. "His blood stains my hands."

She had power. Her hand struck the middle of his chest, pressing him down into the bed. He crashed, feeling nothing but the hard wooden surface of the frame of the cradle, though sheets covered the planks. He didn't notice the sweet softness of the sheets; all he felt was the stinging hurt of the wood against his back.

Her lips found his again, this time pressing harder, stronger. She broke away painfully. "I'll never be clean again."

His touch found the supple skin of her flesh and she shivered. It was all that she wanted.

"You know what's between us?" She questioned him with a desperate anger. "This?" She felt the hem of his pants. "It's just cloth. Just something manufactured someone made up because there was no other explanation."

She let him peel off her own resistant top, taking away all that was left between them.

Tru whispered, "I don't want to live like that."

* * *

It wasn't quite morning. Well, yes, it was. But no light peeked over the horizon. It was quiet, and no one ruined that silence. Even if they wanted to, they couldn't. Tension persisted; the grating gnawing of unspoken words taunted them relentlessly. Brisk and cold, the awkward stress between them stretched until the fear of it shattering hung loose in the air.

Avery stretched her tired limbs without moving the rest of her body. She couldn't risk it, not with Harrison lying so still beside her. She stifled a yawn, rolled her shoulders, and tossed her blonde-streaked hair behind her head, before burying her skull into the placid pillow.

Eyes wandering, Avery touched the ceiling with the tips of her pupils, tracing the intricate detail and patterns of the plaster above her. She remembered the first time she had come to Harrison's apartment; it was a party, to celebrate his lucky fortune.

Although, come to think of it, luck may not be the most accurate word to describe how Harrison had acquired his already-furbished apartment. Not that Avery had anything against Richard Davies; by all means, she admired her friend's father, lending a helping hand to his son. It was generous. Kind. Compassionate.

In fact, his actions surmised everything she had been told was nothing like Richard Davies, the deadbeat father and ruthless defence lawyer.

It strained her consciousness, plagued the inner workings of her mind. Avery read people; it was a known fact. She could tell Tru was hiding something – had been from day one – and she could tell Harrison hid behind his clown costume because he was afraid of the broken parts inside of him. She could not, however, discern why a man who had fathered three children to a wife that had later died, and had then in turn left to nurture another family of his own, suddenly come back and pretend to care about his children. It was not rational; it did not seem logical to her.

But then, neither did a lot of things as of late.

Avery shuttered her aching eyes fleetingly, the image of the ceiling becoming nothing but a glimmering shadow to her.

She knew Harrison was awake, had been for some time. His breathing had become irregular, no longer monotonous and soothing. Now, it was erratic and disturbed.

"It's funny," Avery spoke, her voice like a serrated knife through the linear air, "how things can change in an instant."

It took him a while to move; to make any sign of having heard her. He did, however, stir and shift slightly to one side, away from her. "Yeah, I guess it is. God and all that would be three sheets to the wind by now, throwing dice against the wall."

"Yeah," she responded, a little shaken at Harrison's sudden bitterness, "or something."

Avery let the silence fall. It helped numb the pain.

**

* * *

**

Terror lingered. Darkness fell in the light of the blinding day. It stung, deep within the cavities of life.

Jack wondered why death left a crack in people, watching sadistically as it splits and breaks the person wide open. He hated death. He really did.

He hung on the edge of the bed, balanced, at an impasse. If he slipped off the edge of the bed, he'd leave her there, alone and broken. But if he crawled back inside the covers, gave her the comfort she needed, her himself would be split in two.

He would become broken, too.

Tru stirred and he sat still. She cracked a lazy eye open, just as Jack turned his back to her. In that blurred light of morning, Tru focussed her gaze to the side, Jack's bare back exposed and revealing black ink in a small pattern on the bridge of his spine. She looked at it, knowing exactly what it said. Never quite the artist, Tru did have time however for Japanese lettering. Just a hobby.

Jack thought nobody would know what it really meant. Often, he told girls he would take home for the night it meant something superficial, some snarling word to turn them on. Never had it been known to mean mercy.

Lazy in the morning's glare, Tru shifted, draping the covers over her shoulders and smiling, despite herself. "You didn't show much of that last night. Mercy." She waited for his reaction. It never came. "Any, in fact."

She shuffled closer to him, warm hand reaching out to offer a slight touch to his back. He flinched. Ironic, she thought. Cold skin warmed by touch and still he flinches.

Even from her touch.

"Jack," Tru spoke with an edge of concern, her husky tone forgotten in the harsh light of day, "what's wrong?"

"Nothing," he lied. His hands masked his face as he dripped them over his eyes.

Tru caught his lie, shifted into a sitting position, and draped the covers tighter over her body. She was suddenly cold. "You can tell me. I'll listen."

He was silent for a time, reeling in his thoughts and shaping them in a way he could voice them. It was hard. He wasn't sure he should speak; he feared saying the wrong thing and losing her.

His voice cracked as he spoke quietly in the muffled silence of the apartment, "Did you think you would really be able to lose the darkness if you used me?"

Tru knitted her brow in confusion, plastered a vulnerable look onto her face and twisted her lips. "What?"

"Sleeping with me was a release, Tru," Jack snorted. "We both know it. You thought you could transfer your darkness onto me if you allowed yourself to feel good."

Inside she recoiled as he raised his voice, though on the outside she grew defensive. The dark part of her took control. "I didn't use you. I just…I thought you felt the same way. I wasn't using you."

Stretching his arm, Jack lifted with two loose fingers his shirt from the floor. "Keep telling yourself that, Tru. I promised I would be there for you. I took care of you after Jensen was killed."

She listened, as she promised she would only minutes ago. The only difference was she couldn't believe what she was hearing. "Jack…"

Ignoring her small voice, Jack gave her a final look before walking towards the door. "But I won't do this."

* * *

"I won't do it."

At the angry sound of a phone slamming into its receiver and a frustrated sigh, Harrison took a ginger step into the office and closed the door over behind him, shutting off the outside world and the bustle of unnecessary chatter.

The office was cold, as usual, and it was no surprise to Harrison that his father sat hunched over his desk, greying head of hair cradled between two calloused hands.

"Dad," Harrison began cautiously, stepping further into the abyss of chaos. His voice cracked as he spoke, "you wanted to see me?"

Lifting a hand and waving it about carelessly, Richard rose to his feet. "Harrison. Good. Sit down."

As his father's rough hand gestured him into a lonely chair, Harrison felt the increasing clawing sensation of nausea. "What's this about, Dad?"

Hoping his speech was fluent and casual, Harrison grimaced involuntarily when his words came out blurred and rushed. Richard didn't notice, however, and Harrison sighed, relaxing deep into the leather chair.

Richard leaned against the polished wood and fingered the outline of rough etching around the edges. "This goes without saying, but you've obviously noticed your sister's growing distance from you lately."

Frowning, Harrison shrugged off a tickle of suspicion. "Yeah, I guess she has been different as of late, but I don't see how this has anything to do with us. Her boyfriend just died, Dad. Give her some time."

Shaking his head with another point of his finger, Richard reached for a manila file that rested beneath layers upon layers of messy papers. "No, son. You misunderstand me. I understand grief, believe me, and I've seen what it does to people. I know Tru is grieving, I can see it, but I saw how distant she had become _before _that boy was killed."

Clearly confused, Harrison's frown etched into a bemused smile. "What are you getting at, Dad? You think something else is going on with Tru?"

"Jack Harper," Richard stated simply, coldly. "The young man who came to me a few weeks ago with some legal advice has been contacting me lately. He's been telling me things. About Tru. Stories that, whichever way you look at them, just don't make sense."

Harrison stiffened in his chair, eyes widening, pupils contracting with an erratic snort. Blood pumped furiously through him, heightening his senses, pouring anxiety through his veins. "What about Tru?"

Taking a steady breath, easing the tension in his voice, Richard paused for a bare moment, gathering his words. "Mr. Harper has told me he's been worried about Tru, for some time now. He started following her a couple of months ago, watching where she goes, who she sees. A few weeks ago he followed her and found something he said he wished he hadn't."

Staring at his father, Harrison froze. He knew his sister was in trouble. He just didn't know how far. "What did he find?"

Richard sighed and looked down. With his eyes sheltered by the shadows in the room, he opened the manila folder that rested in his arms, and plucked out a piece of paper. It glistened in the dim light and Harrison dully noted it was a photo.

When Richard's arm extended, fingers curled around the photo, Harrison hesitated before leaning forward in his chair and gingerly cupping the photo in his own hand. He stared at it, blue irises flourishing at the clear image the photo painted in his mind's imprint.

When his son began shaking his head, Richard sighed again and placed a supportive hand on Harrison's quivering shoulder.

"Son, I'm so sorry you had to find out this way."

"No," Harrison murmured under his breath, hand shaking and photo wavering. "No, it can't be right. It's not right."

"Harrison…"

Harrison stood from the chair and stumbled to the door. "I have to go."

An eerie silence passed through the room in the absence of company. It was as if no one existed in the pale office. A moment passed, then another, then…a voice emerged from the dank shadows of the room.

"That was intense," the sultry voice crawled around the room as its owner slinked her way towards the cluttered desk. "I almost thought he would take the bait."

Richard glanced momentarily at Carrie, before fixing his gaze once again to the door. "He will. Give him time."

Carrie shrugged and curled a brow. "Again, something we don't have. And in the mean time we have to worry about Jack and a confrontation with Harrison. Jack won't be happy to know we've involved him in this."

Quick and as smooth as silk, Richard's voice roughened as a little more gravel was shovelled into it. "Jack is never happy."

Smirking into nothing, Carrie ran her tongue over her teeth and turned her head to one side. "Well, almost never."

* * *

He often thought about why it was he stayed on. He often thought about why he had been called to do this. What made him different? What alienated him from other people, to the degree that he could relate better to the dead than the living?

Davis often wondered.

It was strange, this passion that flourished deep inside him. It was an unstable passion, one that needed to be understood and nourished so that he wouldn't lose himself in it. It happened to be a passion that would set him apart from other people for the rest of his life. He hadn't just made death his career; it was his life.

Not many people understood that. Not many people _wanted _to understand that.

Davis was one in a million, called to do something not many would even consider.

Davis was special.

That was why Jack was certain he would understand.

The two stood, very still, not a word among them spoken yet, and the tension was mounting.

The morgue was still, quiet and dank, like any other night.

Rugged and expressionless, Jack ruffled his hands in his pockets, denim jacket rumpled and disquieted in the wake of the many hours he had been rooted to the same stool in the same bar. He took a breath, smelling for himself the stale alcohol and noting dimly that he came across as a drunk.

Strangely, though, it didn't bother him.

Not as much as the darkness that was crawling beneath him skin and digging into what was left of his rotting soul. This darkness, he knew, wasn't born from the years of watching people die and knowing he was the cause. No, this darkness, this suffocating darkness that crushed him until his insides hurt, was the darkness that Tru had given him.

The intimate joining of body and soul between two human beings opened everything up from the inside. For those brief, dangerous moments, everything between those two beings lay exposed for each of them to witness in the other.

Jack had seen her darkness, her weakness, and taken it for himself. He didn't want her to carry it all. He knew sooner than later she wouldn't be able to hold it all in anymore. She wouldn't be able to handle it.

So he took it from her. He made her darkness his own.

And it was killing him from the inside.

Forlornly, he grazed his eyes against Davis'. Looking to the older man, Jack choked back cold tears. "…help me?"

* * *

**A/N: ****I had the idea of Tru and Jack sleeping together from the beginning, and I knew how it would play out, but it took a while for me to figure out **_**why **_**it would happen. It turned out as sort of an exorcism of darkness (on both their parts) on each other. **

**One thing I really don't want to do is have Tru constantly in a state of dire darkness. I wanted Jack to portray a lot of that darkness for her, which will happen in the next couple of chapters. **

**Something I added in this chapter that I didn't necessary need to have put in is the growing relationship between Harrison and Avery. It is shrouded in a lot of mystery at this point, but it will eventually grow into something a lot more steady and solid, and worthwhile. I also like the way Avery can "read" people, as stated in this chapter, and that fact will make another appearance real soon. **

**I'll admit, I've always wanted to write a scene where it's seemingly just two people in a room, then one leaves, and suddenly someone appears from the shadows. It's clichéd, it's predictable, it's unrealistic, but it's creepy, which is why I added it. Carrie adds so much seductiveness and creepiness to the plot so its cool writing her as this enigmatic figure that hides in the shadows. **

**And finally, that last scene with Jack and Davis in the morgue. I've always liked their dynamic, and it just adds so much to the story when two characters who despise each other come together to help one another. **

**Thanks for reading and hopefully the next chapter won't be very far away :) **


	6. Refusal

**A/N: ****After much ado and hesitation, this next chapter is up and running. Much appreciation for waiting so patiently and not tearing my head off because I made you wait so long! Hugs to all. **

**Questions will be answered in this chapter, and a lot more will be raised, so I hope you're ready. **

**Aftermath  
Chapter 6: Refusal**

* * *

_He remembered, delved deep into his memorise, for a time when she had not been so generous. He did indeed remember a time when he was refused by her; a time when he clearly wanted something she so desperately didn't want. It had hurt him, stung him, and even now, continued to sting as he remembered the pain._

Life _was known for her generosity, though at times, that kindness seemed to dwindle, her sweetly open smile does fade._

_He remembered. _

_He had held her, arms wrapped warmly around her resting body, her spirit exhausted from the demands of her life. They had been inside a sanctuary of warmth and contentment, though part of her refused to take all of him. Part of her knew it wasn't right, that something horrible would soon happen. She had known all along, and had refused to become a part of him._

_That was what stung him so much, he thought now. That knowing, that feeling of insecurity in her that warned her of coming events. She had known things would not turn out the way they were supposed to, and she had deliberately distanced herself from him._

_He remembered bluntly the aching in his chest, the dull pounding of conflicting emotions brewing a storm deep within him. _

_He also remembered how much it had hurt her, to know she was hurting him._

_It had caused a rift, the first quake of many to come. That had begun it all. That doubt. That_ feeling_. That refusal._

* * *

Carrie stared. She stared at the table, at the photograph. That odd sense of foreboding warned her. The one that said _get away_. Though, it had been a long time since she had listened to that warning.

She wondered suddenly, how it was she had come to be in such a strange, vindictive scheme. She had been a respected psychologist, one that was reputable and reasonable. Now, she had completely fallen off the radar; she didn't exist as a doctor, she existed as a mole in an operation. An operation begging to come to an end.

The door creaked, its hinges barely old enough to warrant such damage, but Carrie guessed they had been through significant stress. Especially as it was Jack Harper who slammed the door behind him upon entering.

She watched him, a hunter stalking unsuspecting prey, while he sauntered through into the small living room of his apartment. He stopped, dead in his tracks at the sight before him. It had been so long, he had almost forgotten he was actually a part of some scheming idea borne of a mystical gift.

Carrie stretched herself languidly over the sinking leather couch, its bleeding crimson surface complementing her casually laden business suit. With her deep rouge jacket buttoned only at the middle, the white collar of her blouse seeped out at the top edges, its own buttons seemingly disappearing as Jack's eyes travelled down further.

"What do you want?" Jack's cool voice dripped with a frozen edge; his eyes were stained red around the rims.

Carrie smoothed a breath between her teeth. He had been drinking, she could tell. She had a certain affinity for men who drank. Not a good one, she seemed to recall with a bitter remembrance. "To let you in on a little secret."

It was then that Jack, bleary-eyed and disorientated, noticed the plastered photograph on the stainless glass coffee table. Wordlessly, he stalked over, bending slightly and with an unsteady hand, clasped the photograph. He stared at it. He stared without noticing the pure distrust Richard Davies felt for him.

Looking at the photo, the clear image that burned in his mind, he could almost see the blood on his hands again.

Letting the thin strip slither from his fingers, Jack glanced back up at Carrie with a frown that darkened his eyes. "Appreciate the concern," he slurred his words, though only slightly, "but I don't need the babysitting. If Richard has something to say, he can say it to me, without going through you."

There was a momentary pause, one of conflicting confusion and hesitation. And then,

"No offence."

Carrie's face shimmered into a curious smirk. "None taken. But, I must admit, I'm surprised. You're in an incredible amount of danger as it is, and you're not even willing to make it better. What kind of a man does that?"

"One who faces his demons," Jack countered easily, voice saturated with cold poison. "We done?"

Slowly pulling her fingers away from the soft edges of the couch, Carrie stood, smoothing out her skirt before walking toward Jack. He didn't flinch as she snaked her arms around his neck, fingers lightly dabbling against his cheek. He even responded, letting his own hands find the curve of her hips. She touched her lips to his carefully, then lightly caressed his face as she moved closer to his ear.

Whispering softly, she barely let her lips linger close enough to him as she spoke, "I can make it go away. Everything. The photo, the danger. The pain."

With sharp repose, his hands grasped her wrists, tightly. He spoke to her eyes with his own cold ones. "Get out."

Snatching her wrists free, Carrie smeared a look of cold malice across her face, and tried desperately not to let the hurt creep in.

She brushed past Jack, deliberately keeping the photograph laying flat on the glass table, and found the door, slamming it behind her, hurting the hinges even more.

It stung. Stung to the core, his betrayal. His _refusal_. But Carrie Allen was smarter than that. Carrie Allen knew how the mind worked; every crevice, every curve. And she would find a way to break him. Eventually.

* * *

It wasn't an easy thing to do, but Tru knew it was what she needed. She had been disconnected for too long; alone in her fight. It might ease some of the tension if she did this. This, of course, being talking to her friends.

Tru had kept this to herself long enough. Now, she had to find others who were grieving for Jensen. Otherwise, she would slip further into a darkness she had been so close to, and so hesitant to find.

The laboratory was no longer flourishing with life; no more chatter disrupting the quite deaths of the cadavers being inspected. Just a few remained.

Tru had been quiet during the lesson. Too quiet, almost dead herself.

Avery didn't like this. She wasn't used to her friend being so isolated and resigned. She was used to the alive Tru, the one that answered questions directed at her and laughed at a well-placed joke. This Tru, however, stared blankly at the skin she was slowly slicing with a scalpel. This Tru had eyes not dissimilar to those of the body she was dissecting.

Jensen's death did not go unnoticed; in fact, Avery had found her own way of dealing with it. But Tru was hardly dealing; Tru was drowning in it.

"Hey," Avery said gently while briefly touching her hand to Tru's cold one, "you've been quiet. You want to talk?"

The disinfectant that saturated the walls of the lab nearly suffocated Tru as she breathed it in. It was too much for her. "I know. I guess I've got a lot on my mind. Sorry."

When Avery shook her head, her dark-stained blonde curls locked around her neck. "Don't apologise. It's understandable. I just want you to know that you can talk to me. Take your time, though. Just rush it."

Tyler stared at the interaction between the two friends. He knew he could comfort Tru, be there as a friend, relay stories about Jensen and how he cared about so many things. But, if Tyler was to understand it, Jensen wasn't who everyone thought he was. He was a cold-blooded killer; he brutally murdered those women and then shot his father with a cold gun. Jensen wasn't anyone to celebrate.

Tyler hadn't even attended the funeral. How could he, when Jensen, his best friend, could end someone's life in such a malicious way? To Tyler, Jensen had been a monster. And he did not know how he had become such a thing.

* * *

The insecure glow of the sparse office made Jack recoil. The prickling silence held a secret; like something was lurking in the shadows, or the eerie calm before the storm was just beginning to settle. Jack felt the slightest edge of apprehension. It set his nerves and raised the thin hairs on the back of his neck.

The thick plastic film of the photograph rested between two of his fingers, slowing suffocating as he stiffened his grip every so often.

With a small creak, the door opened, then closed quietly. Jack didn't feel the need to turn around to face the man he had come to confront. Not yet.

"Jack," Richard's silky voice hid a slight hesitation beneath it, "maybe next time you could wait before crashing into my office until I'm actually in it." He didn't wait for an apology, not that he expected one. "What can I do for you?"

With his back curled over the spine of the leather chair, Jack watched as his boss took an authoritative seat opposite him, before slamming the photo down on the sweet-smelling pine desk. "You can tell me what the hell is in that photo."

Richard's eyes darkened, though his face never showed any consternation; it remained the ever-calm feature of a mask. "You should sober up, Jack, before the drink starts erasing your memories. If I recall, you were there that night, and you let my daughter murder someone."

Jack's eyes glazed over like ice. Indicating to the photo with a finger, Jack asked quietly, "Then the photo is…"

"Leverage," came the quick answer.

Knowing indeed what that meant, Jack tightened his jaw. Richard was baiting him, using his own daughter to make sure Jack did not stray from the path he was chosen to walk.

After a quiet pause, Richard clasped his hands together tightly, lifting them to his chin while leaning his elbows against the wooden desk. "You lied to me, Jack. You took the fall for my daughter and you didn't tell me."

There was another pause, a silence that expected something deafening to appear. _Calm before the storm…_

"I need to know why."

Jack lifted his eyes at this. He knew it had been coming, and still he was not prepared to answer. Still, with his mind racing and his heart slowing from the hours of alcohol, Jack found himself talking, accusing, "Because you daughter isn't an object. She isn't something you can manipulate for your endgame. She's your daughter, and she's scared. She murdered someone, Richard. Maybe now would be a good time to pay her some attention."

Richard Davies remained a figure made entirely of stone; nothing fazed him, and not a muscle in his face betrayed him. "She's not the only one with blood on her hands, Jack. You are, too. I suggest you not forget that, and the next time I tell you to do something for me, you will do it."

Leverage, indeed.

"Otherwise, that photograph goes missing." Richard straightened in his chair, lifting his eyes. "And believe me, Jack, you do not want that photograph to go missing."

* * *

Clean, tiled walls surrounded her. Strange, the way things can seem to be so, and be something else entirely. Like the morgue. Thoughts generally tether on death and decay when a word like _morgue_ is used, but on the alternative, the morgue was the cleanest place Tru could find. It was a solace to her, different from any other sanctuary. The morgue was not so much a place of death as it was one of life. People die, and they are brought to the morgue, not so that the attendants can learn about their deaths, but rather their lives.

Death happens after you die, life comes before.

If that was so, Tru could not understand for the life of her why she felt so dead.

Footsteps came from the next room and Tru stopped, listening to them pad across the tiles. Davis appeared through a pair of swinging doors, papers in hand and feet in full stride. Until he noticed Tru leaning against the wall, her face flushed of colour, and her eyes dazed and confused.

"Tru? Tru?" Davis called to her, concerned. "Tru, is everything okay?"

Lifting up her dappled eyes, Tru nodded absently before staring at her hands. "Davis, I can't get rid of it. I can't get it out. It's in too deep."

Davis swallowed and guided his hand towards her shoulder. "Tru, maybe you should lie down, try to get some colour back into you."

A tear slid down the side of Tru's cheek, leaving a smeared, unsteady trail on her pale face. "Davis, I can't." She began to sob. Then cry. Then scream. "I can't! It won't let me! _He _won't let me!"

She gripped on to anything she could touch, reached for anything she could find, anything. Anything to keep her from slipping, falling further into that bubbling darkness beneath her. Her fingers curled around Davis' crumpled white coat, her sobbing chest finally resting in his arms. He held her without question, without doubt, without reason. Davis just _knew _he was what was stopping her from slipping over the edge. He had to hold on. And so did she.

"_He won't let me, Davis."_

Her whispers melted with the silence of the room, slipping in and out of consciousness.

"…_won't let me. He won't…"_

…slipping…

"_I can't. Won't let me…"_

…further…

"…_he can't…"_

…gone.

"_He _refuses_!"_

* * *

_He remembered. He remembered that feeling. He remembered the pain it brought him, to know that someone did not want him to have what he wanted. He remembered it and it burned within him. He remembered the refusal, and smiled. _

* * *

**A/N: ****Okay, so I had a little 'Lady Macbeth' thing going on there, with the blood and everything, and to be honest, that was completely unintentional. The last scene came out different to what I had imagined, and I think it works better than what I originally had planned. **

**During this story, there is always a little monologue in the beginning of each chapter from Jensen, who is looking down on life from somewhere above. I liked having that in the beginning of this chapter, and then coming back to it at the end. It gave it a nice touch, a nice little 'wrap-up'. **

**This chapter was basically a 'filler' chapter, where the story strays from any action to instead set up the action for later chapters, and just a little note, please keep in mind the Tyler scene, where he is questioning the kind of person Jensen really was. **

**Thanks again to my committed readers and I look forward to reading your reviews :)**

**Peace.**


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